


the land, the lie, the shape of things

by Waistcoat35



Series: lay me down in sheets of linen, you've had a busy day today [3]
Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: Drawing, Fluff, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Light Angst, M/M, Richard is an artist, Sketching, Sleepy Cuddles, Some angst?, references to canon show events that could be triggering
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-19
Updated: 2020-04-19
Packaged: 2020-12-24 11:09:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21098489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waistcoat35/pseuds/Waistcoat35
Summary: Richard draws things. Thomas notices sometimes.





	1. curiosity killed the cat, discovery brought it back

The first time Thomas notices his hobby is one drizzly April morning, the butler having arrived in London the night before and collapsed into bed in the small hours, curling up against Richard after hours of catching up, talking and laughing and exchanging fond, affectionate touches. He's not been awake more than an hour, more likely half of one, and he's only at his desk next to the bed - not too far away, because Mr Barrow has never struck him as the sort to wake up to a vacant room and a cold, empty bed and take it well. He can sometimes see it in his eyes, now. Only in his eyes.

He doesn’t know if it’s the chill or the lack of a second weight on the mattress or the scratching of lead on paper that has finally awoken his lover – and isn’t that a nice word to use, his lover, his beloved, his _lovely_, for though these are not all words that are ready to be spoken nor received they are all true – but whichever it is, it still ends with a sleepy, protesting sound and some uncoordinated stumbling before Thomas hooks his chin over Richard’s shoulder, bleary-eyed and flushed. It’s a worthy distraction, which is maybe why he doesn’t realise until it’s much too late that maybe Thomas will be scared away by this.

He isn’t.

Initially, he tilts his head to better look at it and tries not to squint at it too much, maybe in case he offends. (And he’s so worried about that around Richard – so, so worried. He hates it, hates it, hates it, hates whoever first made him so careful.) He gives a slight head-jerk that is probably meant to be interpreted as a nod of approval.

“Good, that. ‘s a good picture. Didn’ know you drew ‘em.” Richard shrugs, trying at least somewhat to pretend that a single vocalisation of approval hasn’t got him this pleased. He feels like he might be doing that smile, the bashful one, a slightly broader, more open version of the one Thomas does when something nice is even _implied _about him. (He’s elicited it so many times that he knows how to recognise it now.)

“Sometimes I do, yeah.” Thomas is scrunching his eyes shut tight and relaxing again, blinking a bit to clear away the sleep.

“Who’sit of? Sorry, I should – can’t bloody see yet, is all.” Richard chuckles, reaches his free hand up to muss dark hair he already knows will be tousled. He prides himself on being perhaps the only one to have seen it in its natural state in a good long while.

“That’s alright. Would’ve thought you’d know your own face though.” He can gauge the precise moment of recognition on Thomas’ face, the moment he pieces it all together and a lovely blush pirouettes neatly across his cheekbones. The sketch is slightly blurred in places from the brush of his wrist or the caress of one finger, but its subject is clear enough. From the page a familiar face is nestled into a pillow, one cheek smushed against it, hair tufting every which way but mostly upwards, like soft tussocky grass. Right arm curled around and tucked under the pillow, left one more or less obscured – it was probably being slept on.

He wishes it had been visible, at least so that he could’ve made a point out of drawing it ungloved. (The glove has not been put on for the day yet, and as the visits back and forth mount up along with the length of them, it takes longer and longer each morning for the glove to be put on. It always goes on, eventually. Usually not immediately after getting up, but so far always before breakfast, in which one hand will be in plain sight and the other will be held across the table. This is a little bit sad, of course, but a clock can take a long time to fully wind down, if ever, and he is willing to wait. Willing to wait forever, to never get the result he wants, if need be, because he refuses to barge in and declare Thomas broken and throw himself into fixing him. How could he possibly, when he’s spent so long being broken and being told he’s broken and then ripped to shreds after being clumsily taped back together and being told he’s broken again. After his attempts to ‘fix’ himself have done far worse to him than the breaking ever did.)

“…’s me.”

“It is.” He finally turns his head to look at Thomas properly, finds him looking surprised and pleased and mostly just bewildered. There is a hand resting on the chair. It is the right hand, so he decides he can hold it without overwhelming the man.

“….why?” He’s tilting his head like a confused puppy, and it’s delightful, but Richard pushes past that in the moment. He tightens his grip on the hand enough for it to be a squeeze, but not so as to hurt. Never that.

“Because I draw things I see. I draw things I see a lot. I draw things I wish I saw more often. I draw things I like. That I love.”

“Oh. Right.” He’s still bewildered, but Thomas is definitely pleased as well. He can see the tiny quirk of a lip trying to escape, can see how, for a little while, Thomas lets it. He slides the sketchbook back into its drawer, stands and turns so he can wrap his arms around Thomas, rub them across pale, chilled shoulders as they retreat back under the blankets for a little while longer.


	2. slate and heather, coupled

The next time it comes up is on a day in May, when the sun is like syrup engulfing the hills one by one. On the train, Richard forsakes his paper for watching the scenery whizz by, the journey one he is slowly memorising until he could almost walk the route by foot, and walk it every day. Thomas probably mapped it out from Yorkshire to London long, long ago, because it always seems to be him making the journey down to see Richard, and seldom the other way around – he thinks that maybe he should remedy that. Besides, being in a household with so many staff means he has considerably more half-days and a few more full, so it’s only fair, really.

They meet in the village and take the picnic basket up into the grounds of the Abbey, the best bet for being away from both judgement and prying eyes, further aided by the large oak tree they settle under, stretching up towards a blue-bleached cloudless sky, trunk facing the abbey so they cannot be seen even from there as they spread out a blanket to sit on. Thomas cracks open the picnic basket; he’s brought lunch this time, since it had been agreed it would keep better if it hadn’t sat on a seat in a train compartment for several hours on a day as warm as this, and he unpacks a manner of small delicacies most likely filched from the leftovers of Upstairs’ supper and breakfast or begged from Mrs Patmore. (From Daisy, actually, who has long figured out what sort of meetings Thomas’ little half-day trysts are and is all too happy to assist, though Richard doesn’t know this yet.)

* * *

They have finished the sandwiches, later, and Thomas is sprawled out, limbs stretched over the boundaries of the picnic blanket (because he’s always been one for crossing lines, hasn’t he) with little regard for the grass stains probably making their homes on the cuffs of his trousers. His blazer is rolled up underneath him to tuck his crossed arms on top of, head neatly positioned on Richard’s thigh, juncture between neck and shoulder aligning perfectly with his hip. It is an angle at which Richard can’t possibly imagine feeling comfy, but the slight snuffling, contented sound he hears as a head is gently pushed upward into his hand begs to differ, so he lets it go. The time crawls by like this, minutes and half-hours and eventually, almost two hours. That’s when he sees it.

It is a distant blur, arrow-shaped, a smear of grey against the heather like dust in the eye. As the wind drifts it closer, as Richard’s vision sharpens, he can make out a wedge-shaped tail, jet wingtips that arc down and almost meet before rising up again. It is impossible to see them from here, but he knows that there will be yellow eyes set into the face, beady and lustrous, the shade of the stokelick flame glow in an engine’s firebox. The talons clutch at air as if to feel its rush and know it is catchable.

The creature arcs its wings up, up up, strokes downwards again, Richard’s hand in Thomas’ hair unconsciously repeating a ghost of the movement as it whorls through the strands, as the bird leaves the heather behind for the openness of sky, leaves the sheltered purple curtain for the too-cold, too-hot, too-bright sting of the stage. He watches it flip like a coin, pale cloudbelly facing heavenward for just a moment, flint-tipped wings stretching and tilting as it plummets back down again. Thomas is in a doze, lulled by the sunlight and the saturated saccharine affection, and it is only a reluctance to drag him from his peaceful doze (and perhaps his own, almost-paralysing reverie for the creature he is watching) that stops Richard from rousing him to see this sight.

The dance goes on, and the dance goes on, and before he knows it he’s pulled out his little pocketbook, a brittle stub of pencil, and the next time the bird arcs up he sketches rough and quick, catching the sight between the fibres, between the pencil lines, the image singing, wings caught between the strings of a lyre. Once it is done in its basest capacity, he sets the book down – if he wants to draw it bigger later, he knows he’ll remember enough of the sight to fill in the details. The bird drops into the heather then, parachuting down and sinking back through it, a king donning his cloak, and he is lanced with regret for not waking Thomas, who lies limp and sleep-strewn still.

Then, he has good reason to. The shape is rising again, springing from nowhere, and it has been joined by another. The second worries over, catching up, underbelly a warmer ochre than the light against the oak tree’s bark, softer than the press of the head in his lap, and her feathers will be barred like fencepickets in a field. It is a sight he can picture vividly, trace back along the grain his life has followed and find the memory, a knot in the wood. The steadiness of his father’s hand at his back, a boy of eight, the steadier glare of the female bird from a post not all that far away. His father had taken him to see it a number of times, climbing the slope behind the house to the fields before a path was made there. The memory grafts onto the present, the female bird curving under, arcing over her mate. He makes the choice, and rouses Thomas.

“wha-?” he shushes the confused mumbling, lifts his right hand – the idea of removing the left from Thomas’ hair cannot be considered without a decent amount of guilt – and points. Leans down toward his left leg, head resting somewhere just over Thomas’ own so as to better be heard. He keeps his voice soft, as it needs to be in these hazy half-summer moments, when his partner has just woken up and is gazing, confused but earnest, in the direction he has specified.

“Look.”

Thomas looks, and Richard can tell he has seen now, is captivated even as he refuses to alter his position. “Hen harriers, right? Heard we’ve got a couple.” And from the hushed tone, almost reverent himself, Richard can tell he understands. He understands, or he knows it is important to Richard. Either one makes his heart swoop and twirl not unlike the harrier has been. 

"Yeah. You're right. All through Yorkshire, they are," and he hopes the smile on his face has diffused into his voice so that Thomas can hear it, can know, can know it's meant for him as well. "Dad took me to watch some, when I was a lad. Must've been, what, eight. Not that far from where we lived - it was less busy, then, as well." The birds haven't stopped, chasing and churning in the sky, and Thomas props himself up slightly on his crossed arms, still tucked underneath him. "They hunt the game birds, sometimes. Some folk don't like them much. Less so if they're seen together." 

Thomas huffs. "Know how they feel." 

He had meant because of the implication of young birds to feed. He knows Thomas knows what he meant, and also knows what he himself thinks. Neither mentions it. 

"Shoot at them, sometimes. They'll be alright though, I reckon. In the end." 

"Do you?" 

"Yeah. They're made of tough stuff. Some people won't like it, and they might not change their minds, but they'll scrape through." 

The birds drift away again, as if aware it is not them who are being talked about anymore.

* * *

Later, when he is back in London, (not back home, because London does not have hills and heather and his parents ready to great him. It does not have harriers. It most certainly does not have Thomas.) he draws it out properly, the skyswept slate grey of the pirouetting bird against summer clouds. It is good, he thinks - he hopes - and he thinks he is done. But he remembers all that they said, all that they saw, and he has to draw the second, as if it can't quite be separated from the first. The smooth, guarded grey and the soft, sunlit, beckoning brown wings. 

Somehow, he does not like it as much as the sketch. He doesn't know what to name it, either, and so he doesn't bestow a name on it. He regrets not showing Thomas the sketch, and doesn't know quite why he didn't.

He looks at the picture again. It reminds him of the day, but only as a monochrome wedding photograph would remind one of a beautiful dress.

He sells it on a week later.


	3. if you cannot want, i'll allow you to keep

It is early June, and Richard has just finished his half-day. He bids Miller goodbye, and once he’s left the grounds, steps back out into the much more real London streets. It is strange, still, how they are darker and yet lighter at the same time – absent are the gleaming edges of every surface in the palace, instead gilded with soot and grime, varnished with a mirrorslick of motor oil in each puddle. Simultaneously, it all seems more genuine, less closed-off; less musty old rooms, nothing restricted under stark white sheets, furniture like bodies in shrouds.

Now he is out, and everything around him – pushing, shoving, bustling – is alive. People are hunched and cowed and some are dark, misled, mocking miseries of humans, defaced effigies of what they might have been before they came to the city and let its acid rain erode them, but they are all alive nonetheless. He feels, today, like he can easily be lonely in a room full of people. He misses Thomas dearly, he does, but to an extent it’s always been like this – he’s always been someone who is vaguely afraid of being alone with his thoughts for too long. It doesn’t help that he misses Thomas, though.

_God_, does he miss him.

He drops his things off at his flat, and as an afterthought grabs his pocketbook before going back out. He wants to call Thomas, wants to hear a friendly voice right now, but their free days don’t correspond this month and Thomas will still be working, especially this early in the day, so instead he heads for St. James’ Park. Once he gets there the air will feel clearer, brighter perhaps, and without quite meaning to he finds himself subtly playing a game of don’t-step-on-the-cracks. He finds himself often doing things like that now, ever since last year, since that fateful visit. Because Thomas – Thomas is silly and witty and, despite his guardedness, has no small amount of boyish charm, and it makes Richard giddy, even just to think about it.

Upon finding a bench, he brings out his book, brings out the pencil, and just waits. He always wants to draw one of two things – something to reflect his mood, or something to reverse it, and this time it is the latter. He wants to draw something cheerful, something silly, something not-lonely, and so when a family heads across the grass with an exceptionally large great dane, he takes the chance. The pencil starts to move.

* * *

Several hours later, he has a double-page spread filled with every dog that has passed through the park since he first sat down. A curly-haired miniature poodle leaps from the corner, tongue lolling. A lithe, anxious-eyed greyhound occupies the upper left hand corner, a whippet gazing dolefully up as in hopes of food from the opposite one. Several of them have shown an interest as they were walked by – as they walked their owners by, rather – and the whippet had indeed stayed frozen beside the bench despite a good amount of yanking on its lead, despite his empty pockets absent of scraps. He likes them, of course – he does like dogs.

But he knows that Thomas _loves _dogs.

* * *

He had seen it on the visit – Tiaa had wandered her way into the downstairs quarters amidst the rushing servants from both households, likely unsettled with all of the chaos and work going on to get upstairs ready and looking for somewhere more quiet. In the space of five minutes she had been shooed by Carson, tripped over by Monsieur Courbet, glared at by Miss Webb and clapped at by Mr Wilson, and had begun to look quite distressed. He’d been considering trying to get hold of her and take her out of the way of any further scolding, but then Thomas had stepped out of one of the rooms and, upon seeing him, the Labrador had shot over almost faster than blinking. Thomas had been quite calm for having a reasonably large dog propelled at him, and had just about managed to avoid falling over backwards as she had half jumped-up, wrapping her paws around his knees in an enthusiastic, albeit strange, canine hug. He’d also, however, let out a soft, high-pitched _“oof” _that Richard has found absolutely _wonderful _to think back on ever since, and then glanced up, startled, as Richard chuckled from further down the hallway.

“Good thing I’m not on duty, eh? Couldn’t go up there with big golden bits of fluff on my trousers, could I?” The last two words had been directed entirely towards the dog, who was almost trying to tug Thomas downward, and said in that special voice reserved specifically for endearing animals and small children.

Richard had laughed. "I don't know - if she always does that, it might have to become a part of the uniform." Thomas had grinned, a nervous, half-formed thing, and the gesture had smacked Richard squarely in the face, because he was just beginning to realise that he might, in fact, be utterly gone on the house's head butler.

"It's become a habit, I won't lie. She's probably a bit unsettled - think I'll nip out with her for a few minutes, stop her from getting under their feet. Or stop them from stepping on here." He patted his shin twice before rising, passing Richard and going down the corridor, Tiaa trotting eagerly behind. Something about the dog's expression had told Richard she would've followed him with or without a signal to. As the door to the courtyard and gardens swung open, Thomas had looked back, stopped - seemed as if he might ask for something. But then a slight shadow had stolen over his face, eyes casting back down to the floor, and as Richard took a step forward he'd wondered what had _happened _here, just what had been done to this brilliant, charming man that he was so closed-off. 

"Mr Barrow -" and the man had frozen, turned back around with an expression so painfully hopeful it made Richard want to keep over, "I'm feeling rather unsettled by this whole affair myself. Put the wind up you, don't they, that lot rushing around and trying to take over the house. If it's alright with you, I've a mind to come and join you both." 

Thomas had straightened up, eyebrows almost shooting clean off his face before he schooled his expression once more into something resembling nonchalance. "Yeah, I- 'course. Tiaa won't mind." He stepped back out and held the door open for Richard. "Can't say I mind either, to be honest." And there was that look - the slight upward flicker of his gaze, almost impish, waiting for a response - _Is this okay, have I ruined it, I hope I haven't, I'm used to people telling me I have and now I don't know if I can stop. _

Richard had melted.

"Looks like we're all in agreement, then." He'd followed him out, the dog between them the only real extra space there as they headed away from the house. "As for the royal staff - I know they can be a pretty nightmarish lot. You were saying earlier, about knocking them down a peg or two?" 

"I might have."

"Well. If there's a telephone we can use in the village..." 

* * *

He comes back from the memory, most likely looking indescribably fond where he sits, still staring down at the page in a stupor. It feels as though he is getting closer to something, something he is trying to get the measure of before he commits it to paper, to memory, to heart. 

The page of sketches ends up in an envelope being posted to Yorkshire the very next day, and he never does stop to question just why he had put it in. There are many explanations, and they're all true, but he goes for the simplest.

Thomas loves dogs, and he wants him to have things that he loves.


	4. always on my mind

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!! This is a new author's note because since I uploaded chapter 4 my lovely wonderful friend @niryda on tumblr has illustrated this fic!!! If you want to see a page of Richard's sketchbook (complete with notes!!) you can see that here: https://imgur.com/a/dyaJLsO
> 
> Enjoy!

They meet again once more that year, the later summer months giving over to another tour in which few letters can be sent and visiting days cannot be arranged, given that they are travelling the opposite end of the country this time. They agree that it’s fine, that it won’t be too long, but he feels the longing in Thomas’ voice, coppery and sharp like blood seeping from a wound, and echoes it in his own head. When he finally manages a half-day in September, the best he has any hope of getting, he prepares to break the news to Thomas – they’re too far south, and he has little to no hope of making a train there and back in enough time to see him – only to find that he’s more than willing to travel himself. They meet halfway in Derby, only half the time it would’ve taken to travel from Cheltenham to York, and he’s glad of the choice if only because Thomas glows a bit as he shows him around the town he grew up not so far from, and drags him over to Whitehurst’s former shop. At one point Thomas stops at a window before disappearing inside for a few minutes, returning with a bundle he hurriedly tucks away and will not speak about, to Richard’s bemusement. They duck in and out of shops and get ice cream even though it’s starting to get a bit too nippy. It’s almost enough, and when they get back onto their respective trains he dulls the returning ache in his chest with the memory of Thomas trying desperately to get butterscotch off the end of his nose.

* * *

The second time is Christmas – they plan to meet and spend Christmas Eve at the Grantham Arms, but a day or so before, just as he is packing, he gets a phone call from Miss Baxter. He remembers her from that summer, more than a year ago now, eyes kind but brow always ready to be marred by concern as a dog constantly worries at somebody’s heels. Thomas is ill, she says, and he can picture the worrylines crisscrossing her face, the dark contours on a walking map fraying and branching. He still goes, but he gets the evening train instead of the next morning’s, and when he gets off at York he goes straight to Downton. His cover is, of course, that he’s in the area to spend Christmas with his parents – a truth, at least, because he _is_ meant to be spending Christmas day and Boxing day with them – and had thought to come and give his wishes to the household, having enjoyed their company during the royal visit. The story, as it is, ends up being unnecessary – the moment he knocks at the servants’ entrance he hears a young voice – likely the kitchen girl, it sounds like her – crying out. “He’s here!”

He’s let in swiftly by the housekeeper and ushered up the stairs before Daisy – that was her name – can even offer him a cup of tea, and they’ve evidently been expecting him. Miss Baxter pokes her head out of a room in the corridor, one he recognises because it is the one he had followed Thomas into that night after returning the borrowed car after their adventure in York, the one where they had exchanged breaths and kisses and soft, sweet words. Given that he was evidently expected, he apologises if his being early has inconvenienced anyone, and the reply he gets is validation he didn’t think he would as badly as he does.

“We almost expected it, really. Thomas – Mr Barrow – said that you were planning to come on the evening train, but that once I’d told you why he couldn’t make it you’d most likely hop on the next one there was. He also told me to tell you _not _to do that, but-”

“You practiced selective hearing?” he finished for her with one eyebrow raised and the beginnings of a genuine smile, because it’s clear that she cares for Thomas a good deal. He had hoped (_mostly_ not jealously) that there was somebody here to fuss over Thomas when he cannot be there to. She returns the look, somewhat more warmly than she has before.

“Something like that, yes.” She turns to open the door to the room, and looks back at him. “Thank you for coming. It means a lot, really. He’ll be so pleased.” He gives her a fuller smile, and nods.

“I hope so.”

She looks back at him. “He _will_. I mean it. If it were tomorrow when everyone’s got the day off it’d be different, but Christmas _Eve_ – we’ve all been so busy getting things ready upstairs that he’s hardly seen anyone for more than a few minutes all day. I’ve been checking on him, of course, but-” Even though she trails off, he knows, more or less, what she would’ve said. That with everyone coming and going and having so little time, it’s nice for Thomas to have somebody who’s here for him and him _specifically_. Who’s taken time out of their day just to be with him. He gets the impression that there haven’t been all that many people like that.

He can tell she knows he understands, and they share that last look as she eases the door open. Thomas is tucked tightly up in bed, sniffling somewhat miserably and with his eyes scrunched shut, and as Phyllis creeps back out to give them some time alone he wonders if Thomas would let himself appear so obviously unwell if he had opened his eyes and seen that Baxter had not been alone upon opening the door.

He approaches the chair beside the bed, tread light as he can make it because he knows how it feels to be ill and have the slightest vibration in the ground make your head pulse, and slowly sinks into it. He reaches across and takes Thomas’ left hand in his, ungloved once again, running his thumb across the marred and mottled edge of it, ragged and yet strangely soft like a pigeon’s wingtips beating against his hand.

“Happy Christmas,” he adds, oh-so-softly, and Thomas’ eyes rapidly blink open. He can see the disbelief in them, and decides not to think about it too hard for now, because he doesn’t want to be sad for his visit. “A little bird told me you’ve been in the wars.” He gets a scowl in return, just the right amount of petulance in it that he isn’t _too_ worried.

“f’you can call having the bloody flu being in the wars, then yeah, I s’pose.” His voice is a bit stuffy with cold, and he easily looks and sounds ten years younger than he is. It strips away a little bit of the guardedness from him, and he wishes he could enjoy that without knowing that it’s because Thomas is unwell.

He gives Thomas a smile that is tiny and tender and specially for him, and something that was still coiled and knotted up inside Thomas gives, Richard knows, because he sees it happen in his eyes. He wonders all the time how Thomas could be thought not to have feelings, to be as cold and clinical as he has attempted to make himself seem, when everything is laid out right there for all the world to see. He wonders if it’s only there for _him _to see, or if the others are exceptionally bad at noticing things. He hopes it’s the first one. Just a little bit.

* * *

They meet again in March, a week or so after Richard's birthday. Thomas is unable to get away when he goes up to York to see his parents, so he comes down to see Richard in London. They meet on the platform, and he wishes more than ever that things were different, because he'd seen a bloke waiting for his sweetheart with a bouquet, seen him hug her to him when she arrived and walk off with his arm around her shoulders, bouquet in her arms, and he longs to be able to do that, to see the blush dust itself across Thomas' cheekbones and his eyebrows to raise and for him to get that cautious, split-open look in his eyes - the one he always gets when he is shown yet again that Richard loves him, and does not expect it.

(He longs to see that look because it's Thomas', and yet that's the same reason he wishes he could make sure he never sees it again - he wants Thomas to know, wants him to be pleasantly surprised, but he wants him to be sure enough of Richard that he doesn't _have _to be surprised.) 

The walk to his flat is a little longer than either of them would necessarily like, but given that Thomas has been stuck on a train for the best part of a morning they're somewhat glad of it this month. It's still almost bitingly cold for the time of year, and Richard has to resist the urge to walk faster. The cold makes Thomas tired, and he wants to get him inside and warm. He lets the backs of their hands bump together as they walk, and that's when he realises that Thomas isn't wearing any gloves other than his usual single fingerless one. He stops short, arm extended to gently stop Thomas from walking onwards, and begins tugging his own gloves off, to Thomas' confusion and then vehement protests.

"You don't need to-" 

"No, but I want to," he says, and the street is empty and there's that look in Thomas' eyes, so he takes his by the wrist, careful fluted birdbones he can feel the slide of under his thumb, timorous pulse he can feel under his fingers, and it's like holding a baby bird in your palm, it's like holding just the heart in your palm. He guides Thomas' hand into the first glove, wishing he could warm it by holding it between his own all the while, before pulling so the edge sits protectively at his wrist, just covering the edge of a long white scar that they don't often talk about. (He has tried, once or twice, but he can't stand the cornered look it puts on his partner's face, and he knows better than to try and touch a frightened animal.) Once the second glove is on they carry on walking, and he notes how freezing it is without gloves. Wonders if Thomas' hand already hurts. 

"Thanks," comes the response, sheepish, and he smiles and hopes it will be seen as a way of saying it is unneeded. "I forgot mine." 

"You just need to be a little less forgetful in future, Mr Barrow." Thomas snorts.

"Is all your astonishing life advice meant to be delivered in the same way?" 

Richard raises one eyebrow. "And what way would that be?" 

"Like all of my mistakes are forgivable and you trust I'll do better next time." 

"In that case, yes." He softens further, half-tilted towards Thomas as they walk. He's just that little bit taller than Thomas, astounding given how tall Thomas already is. 

"...why on earth would you look at it that way?" With anybody else he might make a gentle, prodding joke about them fishing for compliments, but - Thomas is genuinely unsure. He really doesn't know why anybody would see his mistakes that way

"Because they are. Because you will." 

The rest of the walk back does not feel as tedious as the walk there had.

* * *

Hours later, it is somewhere in the late evening. They've tugged the curtains shut to block out the streetlamps and the rest of the world, and they're tucked up in Richard's narrow bed with the covers - new checked blue ones, a gift from his parents last week - pulled as far up as they'll go without exposing their feet to the chill. Richard is sitting up, only half under them, but his torso is still warm, quite possibly because of the man currently clinging to him somewhat like a limpet. He doesn't quite know he's doing it - the clinging had only started after he nodded off, bless him. He had started out tucked up to Richard, Richard's right arm around his shoulders. He probably brought his own sleep clothes along, but tonight he's stolen a pair of blue and white striped flannel pyjamas squirreled away in Richard's wardrobe, and he's been struggling with how endearing Thomas looks in his things for some time. 

He leans his head to the right so that his temple is nestled to the top of Thomas' head, the other half-tucked under Richard's chin, and he keeps it gentle in case he wakes him up but he squeezes Thomas to him just that _little _bit tighter, because he loves him, he loves him, he loves him. Loves him so much it sometimes feels like there are moths fluttering in his throat and there's a soaring, rising feeling inside him and he wants to stagger giddily about like he's squiffy when he thinks about how lovely this man is. He reaches down then, thumbs over the smooth cover of the book Thomas had been reading before he'd started nodding. Thomas always brings at least one book with him - not because he expects to be bored, but because he knows that the moment he picks it up Richard has to be nosy and see what he's reading, and ask him about it, and then they'll read it together and Thomas goes all shiny when he talks about things he enjoys. (There's genuinely no other word for it - shiny is the only one that really fits. He says this once, and gets a smart retort - "well, they always said I was bright," and he knows that they never did, but that Thomas really _is_, and he'll probably say something along those lines too, and occasionally Thomas looks as if he might _believe_ him.) 

Needless to say, he rather likes it when Thomas brings a book.

This one isn't what anybody else might have expected him to read - he's the sort for Conan Doyle or maybe Fitzgerald, or at least wants to seem the sort, and he is sometimes, but this time it's something completely different. Master George had apparently acquired a copy of _The House At Pooh Corner _for Christmas and, after reading it to Thomas while he was still bed-ridden (he hadn't even attempted not to smile through that anecdote) had insisted on lending him the first book in the series. They're proving to be oddly charming little reads, and he loves that they've gotten to a point where they can laugh and joke and be vulnerable and read children's books to one another and not feel all that silly. He gives the slim volume a smile before reaching carefully to his left so as to slide it onto the bedside table and avoid it being damaged if one of them rolls on it or knocks it onto the floor, and that's when he notices something. There's a small piece of paper slotted into the back of the book, tucked under a fold in the dust jacket, and at first he thinks it's a blank page-marker or some scrap left in there by the children, but he slides it out, and he stops. 

It's a familiar piece of sketching paper covered in drawings of little dogs. That's his signature, in the bottom right hand corner. Because Thomas has received it, and likes it, and treasures it enough to bring it with him on his trip, to keep it safe in a book so he can look at it whenever he likes. Whether it is good, whether _Thomas_ thinks it is any good, is a different matter altogether, and he both does and does not want to know the answer to that, but the knowledge that drawing it made him happy and makes Thomas happy is all he really needs from it anyway. He smooths it out slightly, noting how little wear and tear there is for a flimsy piece of paper, how carefully it's been preserved, and takes care not to smudge the lead. After a last lingering look, he slides it back into the book. 

Tomorrow, he will leaf through the pages of two more books - his belated birthday gifts from Thomas. They're volumes filled with Thorburn's drawings, one of bird after bird after bird and the other a collection of reprints of his sketches, mainly from the London Zoological Gardens. He'll rest a hand on the gleaming male hen harrier with silky feathers staring dolefully out from the page, let another smile curl and lean, lopsided, on his face as he browses through and feels his beloved curled beside him with a hot drink. He'll look at all of the tiny little details one has to really _know_ Thomas to pick up on, and piece them together, and be able to tell that maybe this man really, _really _loves him, as much as he loves Thomas, and that though he hasn't said it aloud (and he is not a violent man, but by God, he wants to pummel anybody who's made Thomas feel like something dreadful will happen if he _does _say it) he's said it in every other way that there is, every single way that _counts_. He'll think on how Thomas is here for three days - they'd skipped on any time off they were given from after Christmas onwards, saved it up like pocket money (except far more precious) so that they could have longer together at once, could enjoy each evening without dreading the goodbye hours later - and wonder if, if the other is amenable, they might be able to slip in a trip to the zoo. They do both rather like the sketches of that osprey, after all.

Tomorrow, he'll do all of that. But for now, the book is on the nightstand, and Thomas has rolled over properly onto his side and can only be described as _snuggling_ into him, little huffs of breath warm against Richard's neck and sliver of exposed shoulder, arm fumbling in his sleep before wrapping around Richard's torso, Richard's hipbone cushioned by Thomas' slight pudge of stomach as he clings and curls up and soaks up Richard's heat. The arm that was around Thomas' shoulders is now draped snakingly down his spine, and he rubs up and down his back ever-so-gently, once, twice, before putting the lamp out and blanketing them in the cool of the night save for a small buttery slot of light coming from the door, just slightly ajar. He's never said, but he gets the feeling that Thomas isn't entirely keen on complete darkness, and though he rarely wakes up in the night, the chance that he might do is enough to make Richard ensure there's a little bit of light. He's never liked it much himself, anyway, when it comes to that. 

For now, he shifts slightly, pulls the covers up to tuck one corner under his shoulder and the other under Thomas, blankets up to both their shoulders, and presses the softest of kisses to what he _thinks _might be the bridge of Thomas' nose, or perhaps his forehead - he isn't quite sure, in this dimness. His reward is a content, sleepy mumble and a face nuzzled into his neck, and then he sleeps, and while he sleeps, he dreams of dogs, and maybe of someone else.


	5. if butlers were birds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNINGS FOR THIS CHAPTER:  
\- discussion of Thomas' s6 suicide attempt, though I have avoided their discussing it in detail there are some graphic word choices in prose later on that allude to it  
\- mention/description of present scars from said attempt  
\- implied/referenced child abuse  
\- kind of victim-blaming?? not in a non-con context but like?? Thomas talking about his emotional trauma etc as if it's somewhat his fault and lessening the seriousness of stuff?? So it can still be read that way??  
\- one small mention of character grumbling about mild weight gain and the other being sweet and reassuring about it - barely there but worth mentioning just in case!  
\- anything adjacent to this that is triggering for you means this chapter should probably be avoided! sorry if I seem like I've gone overboard with warnings, but I'd rather that than have anyone read this and be negatively affected at all, so please please be careful!  
If you have decided not to read this chapter, I'll be doing my best to make sure there's nothing in the next one that you need to have read this one to understand. This chapter was chiefly so that bits of Thomas' past could be discussed because several people seemed expectant of it, and I thought I'd address it.

The next morning, Richard forces his eyes open as if they need to be pried with a crowbar as the cool spring light filters in. The morning feels, somehow, new and exciting like it did on beach holidays as a kid, when he'd wake up and look at a strange ceiling and remember where he was and what they were doing. He feels the very same rush when he remembers that Thomas is beside him, a revelation that does not take a particularly long time to arrive as Thomas twitches and wriggles, not too far from waking. Richard takes a moment to marvel at how much he has managed to shift in his sleep. Thomas had originally been lying snuggled into Richard to his right, nearest the window and where the bed is pressed against the wall (which is what Richard had nudged him towards despite a possible draft from the window, because he has an inkling that his darling gets nightmares sometimes, and would rather Thoams did not do himself a mischief by jerking awake and smacking into the floor or the corner of the nightstand.) Now he is on Richard's left (considering what a light sleeper Richard is, how the _hell _did that happen without him waking up?) and has sunk down the bed so that his feet are wedged uncomfortably between the bars of the bottom bedpost and his head is somewhere around Richard's waist. He looks to be stirring anyway now, so Richard coils an arm around him, under the armpits, and drags him back up the bed slightly. Not wanting to startle him too much, he relents when the top of Thomas' head is close enough to kiss, moves a pillow down to prop that raven-dark, downy-soft head on again. 

Thomas wrinkles his nose, makes a blurry, disgruntled _mmf_ sound, and turns his head begrudgingly to the right, towards Richard. He still doesn't look awake, but Thomas is good at being underestimated, and now it is just barely clear he is watching Richard - or the suggestion of it is there, rather, his eyes cracked open just a sliver. Richard can see where the morning light hits them, the pale gleam of Thomas' gaze. It is soft, and yet so intently focused. Then the spell is broken, or maybe a new one is cast, as he shifts and rolls half-onto his right side, nearer now. The movement jostles his pyjama shirt so that Richard can see a small stretch of the creamy skin of Thomas' stomach, which he gently rubs a hand over as he slips a hand up Thomas' shirt. He lets his hand rest somewhere on Thomas' left side, his hip, or perhaps the junction between the two, thumb still smoothing across his stomach, and Thomas gives this contented little _sigh _that means absolutely everything. He shivers a little, and Richard belatedly realises that the duvet has abandoned Thomas after all his squirming. He untucks it from between them, Thomas lying on the edge of it, and slides the hand on his side up to the bare skin of Thomas' spine, the vertebrae ducking and rising like solid waves as he strokes his back once, twice, before pulling him closer until they are pressed together and he can drape the covers back over Thomas, tuck them under his right side, the one he's lying on, after smoothing them over him. Richard shifts down the bed until they are level once again, holds Thomas safely to him - both hands are under his shirt now, because Richard is the one who runs hot and wants to instil some of that warmth into Thomas' skin, his veins, his bones. His heart.

Thomas presses his forehead to Richard's, brow slightly scrunched as he struggles to wake, until Richard makes it clear there's no need yet. He carefully nuzzles into Thomas' neck, his cheek brushing up and down it, before tucking Thomas neatly under his chin, a cool, cuddly weight, and murmuring a "G'morning, lovely." Thomas wriggles in delight and presses himself close enough that he seems to be trying to merge with Richard, graft onto him. No longer a bird sheltering in a tree, but two trees growing so close together it will soon be impossible for them to grow apart. He presses his nose - which is bloody _freezing_, thanks for that, Thomas - into the juncture of Richard's shoulder and neck, makes another pleased noise, and promptly falls back asleep. 

Some time later they wake, together this time, Thomas snuggled into Richard's chest as he was the night before, and when they get up Richard takes his housecoat from its hanger and takes great pleasure in putting it on Thomas, guiding his arms into the sleeves, smoothing its lapels (it may be pointless for such an article, but though you can give a man a day off from valeting, you cannot take the valet out of the man,) straightening its collar if only to have the excuse to brush his thumb against Thomas' nape, and tying the belt snugly so that he won't get cold. It is not as baggy on Thomas as it might have been a few months ago, and although he is still mostly angles they smooth out more easily now, especially in sleep. There's an ever-so-slight softness to him that there wasn't before, and when Richard had shifted him up the bed, or carried him to it after a late evening where they have fallen asleep on the sofa, he had noticed that Thomas wasn't nearly as light as before. He is, quite frankly, delighted, because all he wants is for Thomas to be looked after, taken care of, and it would seem that even Thomas himself has figured that out now. He seems happier, and it shows - his face, smooth and blank in the old staff photographs Richard has been privy to, has gained the same amount of smile lines in the last few years as the others have since moving to Downton, he'd wager - and Thomas seems to have no quarrel with it. With any of it.

(Apart from once, when he had noticed the softness first for himself and grumbled offhandedly about it.

_"I'm getting a bit of a stomach, it seems."_

_"Well, I like your stomach."  
_

_"That so, Mr Ellis?"_

_"More than. It's sweet."_

_"Well, then." _

And he had done that pleased, embarrassed little smile - almost as big as the one he'd gotten at the end of the royal visit - and that had been that.

_"Is that what you've found, Mr Barrow? A friend?"_

God, he's _besotted_, isn't he. Can't even think straight, these days.) 

Richard makes them breakfast on the stove, eggs and bacon for himself - a day off tradition - while Thomas nurses a cup of coffee and a bowl of porridge that he has noticed Richard had stirred shavings of chocolate into, and is entirely failing at acting nonchalant about it. He just sits there looking pleased, warming his hands on the bowl, less ruffled than Richard had expected him to be at the discovery and subsequent exposure of his persistent sweet tooth. He needs to have Thomas over for breakfast more often, just so he can see how many smiles he can collect by slipping treats into his porridge. They hook their legs together under the table, the jut of Thomas' ankle poking Richard sharply in the shin, and for good measure he reaches over and takes Thomas' hand in his and smooths it with his thumb until the skin warms. The smile this elicits isn't the bashful, pleased one of a few minutes ago - that one's for when Richard's complimented him especially obviously or done some little favour or given some little gift - nor is it the small, tentative one for public or when he's said something that Thomas had badly needed to hear and doesn't quite believe. It is open and fond and familiar and maybe just a _little _bit pleased with himself - if he was told this he'd deny the last apart, say he couldn't be pleased with himself if he hadn't actually _done _anything, but he has loved and he has let himself be loved in turn, and in a world like this with people like these that is _such _a hard thing. (Richard likes to try his best to be an optimist, but he would not disrespect Thomas by asking the same of him - least of all criticise him for not being able to.) Spurred on by some ridiculous impulse - probably the same one that makes people squeeze endearing things tight and not let go - he reaches across to Thomas and taps one fingertip on the end of his nose, just lightly, just for a second. Thomas looks down, eyes nearly crossing to try and see the end of his nose, and then his gaze slides up to Richard's face again, both eyebrows raised and his smile mostly staying the same but becoming slightly indulgent and patiently long-suffering. He doesn't tolerate Richard's ridiculousness - he damn near _revels _in it, and that feels rather wonderful.

Then he reaches over towards Richard's nose and _flicks _it, and amidst his yelp Richard remembers the part of Thomas that isn't all smiles and sweetness, and finds he loves that too. 

* * *

They go to the London Zoological Gardens, as planned, and it might not be the trip two grown men usually go on, but it is the kind of trip Richard's parents didn't have the time or money to take him on, and the kind Thomas' father wouldn't have taken him on had he suddenly won the lottery. Though he's been to London for multiple seasons and had evenings off and such, Thomas has never been here, and though he tamps it down he reacts not too unlike he would have if he were still a lad being taken for his birthday. (Mental note: when _is _that?) 

Richard has been more times than he can count - inevitable considering how long he's been here, but also a damn sh.ame, because he imagines if neither of them had been before and could explore it for the first time together. However, since he has been before, he does the noble thing and assigns himself the job of reading Thomas facts from the infomation boards while Thomas gets to actually look at everything, and if he gets tired of Richard wittering on about the black-footed penguin and stopping to draw the osprey he doesn't show it. (He's quite glad about that - sunny as he attempts to be, he will reluctantly admit to himself that his enthusiasm's embarrassingly easy to dampen if somebody rejects it outright.) He asks about Richard's visits before, and he recounts one from a little before the war, when he had visited as a footman and laughed as several of the younger lads from the palace staff rode - or rather, fell off - of the camels.

They see Winnie, an American black bear and, as they discover from a nearby keeper, the namesake of George's beloved book. Later on, on the way out, Richard will help Thomas rifle through the postcards for one of the bear, because "If this gets out and I didn't take anything back as a souvenir of having met that bloomin' bear, Master George'll never forgive me." Richard very politely will not point out that, unless Thomas tells the boy of the visit himself, it is very unlikely there will be any need to compensate for it. They laugh at the strutting, scowling Secretary Bird, and at one point stand with their shoulders pressed close together to allow a cockatoo named Joey to shuffle between one and then the other. Richard can tell, however, from the concentrated, reverent attention he gives it, that Thomas' favourite is the clouded leopard. It's a happy coincidence - so is his. He does a sketch of it as Thomas lingers there, watching it pad up and down the enclosure, and though he has sketched it a hundred times this one is different because it is as Thomas has seen it - through his eyes. 

* * *

After their outing but before going home, Thomas tells him. "I have something I need you to know about," he says, "and I can tell you now or I can tell you next time, but I don't know how well it'll keep. If I don't say it now I might not be able to." And he thinks he's spoiling it all, Richard can tell, is calling himself stupid and small and selfish, is beating himself down even in his head, so he takes Thomas by the elbows, more firmly than the hands and less forcefully than the shoulders, and he kisses him, and he listens, foreheads leaned together to trap secrets spoken before they can fly away, let them flutter in the space between their faces. Thomas is just a little bit shorter than him, and now the difference feels far greater than usual, Thomas feels so much smaller in his hold, like he'd like to curl up into a ball of shivers and sharp bones and soft dark hair and just...disappear. Richard does not feel small. He feels big and angry and protective as he is told about a time, just a few years ago, when a very unhappy young man tried to put himself through something awful because the world did not want to make a place for him, and caved in on him when he tried to dig one out. He trembles with the anger of it, the hot-cold blazing _fury _ of knowing what has been done to Thomas, and he doesn't even realise it until Thomas finishes and looks at him, just looks at him, with a wariness that is not only from telling the story, and asks if he's terribly cross with him. Those aren't the words that come out of his mouth, of course, but they're the ones that are the most important. His expression is - _expectant_, in the very most dreadful way.

The shaking stops, as Thomas' has not long started. He realises his grip is a little bit tighter than before and loosens it, rubs apologetic thumbs over the spot. "Thomas. I'm not angry, darling. I'm not. Not with you. Never with you. Not for this." His hands drift down to the cuffs of Thomas' shirtsleeves, pause at where they gape and expose slivers of wrist, but do not go further until Thomas lets him. When he assents, he lets his hands drift up a little to the gapes in the sleeves just past the wrist, not yet fastened shut, and let's his thumbs slip into them, slowly rubs at the hidden, pale expanses of Thomas' forearms until he feels the scar on each, ever so slightly raised. Thomas has worked up a very fine tremor again, and he wishes he could tell if it were from the touch or the placement of it. Or perhaps he doesn't. "It's the rest of the bloody world I'm angry at."

Thomas laughs, meant to be a harsh, barking sound that comes out weak and a little wavering. "s'funny. Everyone else tells me I shouldn't feel like that, don't you go and do it for me." And that makes Richard pull him close again, arms all the way around him and holding like he can't ever bring himself to let go. 

"You should. You've every right to. Thomas," and he won't meet his eyes, unsure, but - "_Thomas_, you have _every right _to feel angry. Angry at what's been done to you, what's been done to _all of us_ -" 

"Sometimes," Thomas says, "it just feels like they're right, and I really shouldn't be complaining. After all, 's-" his voice thickens, "s'not like anything _that _bad's happened to me. Really. Just made a few mistakes and faced the consequences of 'em, that's all." And they both know it's not true, deep down - he's been hurt, been battered and bruised physically and not, by his father and his peers and some people he now calls his friends, he's been stamped into the ground and picked up again and made to carry on, emotionally limping towards a finish line that _just wasn't there_. Richard pulls his face away a bit, focusing very intently on his next words.

"You have _every right_. You haven't been treated well, by - by just about anyone, really, and nobody who isn't you has the right to take that away from you. _Nobody but you_, Thomas, do you understand me?" And Thomas nods, and he's properly trembly now, deep-set in his spine and in the locked muscles he's forced not to let him jump or pull away through the conversation, his expression the strained, almost-hunted one he'd worn when he walked out of that police station. Richard holds onto his upper arms and gives him a requesting look that Thomas assents to before Richard slowly, slowly places a hand at Thomas' shoulder blades and pulls him in again, arms under Thomas' and around his chest and slowly rubbing his back through the shirt.

When he gets on the train, Richard already misses him, all over again.

* * *

_He isn’t an expert, he wouldn’t say, but Richard Ellis has proven to be rather adept at reading people, and this skill has provided substantial evidence that the butler of Downton Abbey may be the slightest bit head over heels for him. The feeling’s mutual, of course, how could it not be, god, just _look _at him, the gorgeous thing, but the revelation is still bouncing around inside him a bit like one of his mum’s rock cakes when she’s gone to stop his father from doing himself a mischief at his work bench and forgotten that they’d been in the oven. It is not, however, making him feel half so ill. _

_He wonders, sometimes, about skeletons. About what they really are, what they really do – they are the foundation of the body, he supposes. The base, the framework, the supporting structure of it all. There to stop the messy bits falling out. If they’re such an integral part of you, he wonders, then why are they made only of bones? Dull, dusty, brittle things that snap and tremble at every opportunity. If a skeleton is the framework of a body, then it ought really to be made up of more important things. Things that make up the person. _

_Birds have hollow bones, he knows, has known for a long time, ever since he was a boy, and asked his father how the harriers floated over the moors so gracefully. Thomas is already so birdlike, a contained beauty and elegance to him that cleaves through Richard, and yet it takes only one thing or another and he's set off-balance, flapping and fluttering in his clumsy wild way, and somehow both are birdlike. How similar, he wonders, is he to one, really. If Thomas Barrow had hollow bones, what would Richard see in them? If he were cut open, jagged edges baring everything inside, if he bled, would he bleed love or hatred or pain? Richard tries not to think about the second question, because sometimes he has dreams about it and Thomas bleeds too much. Thomas has confided in him about it, and it is a burden he will happily help bear, but the thought of his darling suffering so miserably, so viscerally is one he will shy away from for the rest of his days. _

_Back to the bones of the matter, then._

_Thomas has not said "I love you". Somehow Richard knows it anyway, perhaps even better than were he to say it. There is more than one way to say it, more than one form in which the message carries, and Thomas can master any of them, all of them, save for the conventional one. He has told Richard a million times in a million forms, and he will not stop. He has told him in knowing how he likes his tea and in putting Richard's scarf on for him and in seeing how he goes rigid and will not move from loud, suffocating sounds but never questioning, never laughing at it._

_If butlers were birds with hollow bones, those spaces are where this one would store his "I love you"s._

* * *

Some time after Thomas' visit, Richard does a sketch of a photograph taken on the day that he'd had sent back to him - Thomas is standing in a low, open pen over a large tortoise, at a very awkward angle given the difference in height, grinning in unbridled glee as it munches a large lettuce leaf he had given it. His coat is rolled up and tucked under his arm, his jacket unbuttoned, his hair beginning to go floppy again in the wind, and Richard loves it. He sketches it out, because he's not got enough free time to write a proper love letter, so he'll send one in a different way, and puts it in the envelope along with the one of the leopard, and one for Master George, of Winnie the Bear - this one is more of a small print, really, easy to put up in the nursery if desired. He has phoned and written and read as much as possible since the visit, both from missing Thomas and desiring to make sure things are alright, to cheer him and remind him that there are nice things waiting for him and that he deserves them. The drawings, fortunately, are one way in which the nice things can go to _him_. 

And if the letter he gets from Downton soon afterwards, in handwriting that isn't familiar and signed with a name that is definitely _not _of someone downstairs has anything to do with it, the drawings are not the only thing that'll be with Thomas very soon. He grins, and can't stop grinning, as he packs his case, _large _sketchpad included this time, and informs his parents he'll be looking in on them again sooner than expected - and for a little longer, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If the government are stalking my chrome history all they'll find is multiple searches for ZSL guides from 1926-1928 detailing various specific animals from the zoo....that I searched at 2am
> 
> also if you thought my mentions of that photo of Thomas were vague and assumed it's because I was bad at researching souvenir photo development in 20s London and wanted to avoid inaccuracy you were so so right. but like?? even if it would've taken 2 weeks to get the pic developed?? sure, I left time for that
> 
> Finally: In case you didn't see it, go back to the last chapter's author notes if you want the link to niryda's GORGEOUS illustration for this story!


	6. so i think it's best we both forget before we dwell on it (the way you held me so tight all through the night 'til it was near morning)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title is from the song Love Love Love by Of Monsters and Men because they own me forever. Fun fact: I've just finished this at about 4:30 am, and my tired brain went "hmm, what's Richard's middle name? Grant?" And my brain then supplied the sentence "Grant is short for Granthony," so now I'm sat here giggling to myself like a bit of a lunatic.
> 
> For trigger warnings:  
To do a general warning, I'll say that if anything from the trigger warnings last chapter gave you cause to avoid it, probably assume you should avoid this one. Things from the last chapter (Thomas' s6 suicide attempt, mainly, mention of his past attempt/self-harm scars potentially, and possibly other bits) are mentioned again - sorry, I know I said I'd try to make this chapter readable without having read the last one, but it tied in well with the plot to mention it again. There's less direct mention of it from Thomas - it's more about the effect that finding out about it had on Richard, and his reaction to a dream about it (not described, just mentioned, so nothing graphic this time) which I understand could be upsetting to read for some. Also featured are Richard's concerns about homophobia from downstairs (they remain concerns only, don't worry!)

After he has acquired permission from Mr Miller to take his longer period of leave for the year (he usually saves it for Christmas, but he had managed to make this Christmas just past, and so won't be in as much trouble with his mother if he can't scrape together any more time off for the one coming up) Richard is on the train to York laughably quickly after getting the letter. His Majesty is not planning to travel very far for some time and, as of the moment, is not hosting anyone, and the lack of eventfulness means he can be better spared than were he to ask during a busier part of the year. He spends the first half an hour reading the rest of his newspaper, and when he finishes with it he considers the crossword for something to do - but he remembers walking into the servant's hall last summer and seeing Thomas doing it, pen poised between pale, slender fingers, how his mouth had gone dry right before asking Thomas to York and getting a dismissal that wasn't actually ever a _no_. Even then, the rebuke hadn't phased him - it had felt more like Mr Barrow was trying to see if he was willing to put effort into his attempt to - well, to _woo_, really, he thinks, with an embarrassed half-grin to himself since the compartment is empty. He'd been like a bowerbird trying to win over a mate, flitting around everywhere Thomas was and puffing out his chest, trying to impress him, to convince him. (And he _had_been impressed, he thinks, self-satisfied. Very impressed indeed, considering they'd hardly been back at the abbey five minutes before he was being pressed against a doorframe with Thomas Barrow kissing him as if the world was burning around them. Perhaps it had been - neither of them would've noticed.)

But anyway. The paper is a London one, unlikely to be sold in one of Downton's shops, and he imagines they all have different crosswords (or do they just reuse one another's and hope some poor seepy bloke on a sunday morning won't notice the clues in the Mirror are the same as in last week's Guardian, he wonders,) so doubtless Thomas will appreciate it. If he gets through them all at the speed he had the one in the servants' hall (which he probably does, the brilliant, clever sod) he must get sick of waiting for the next day's puzzle if he has a tea break and he's already finished that morning's. Were this about anybody else, Richard would chide himself for having gotten too invested too quickly, but, as it were, this is Thomas, and nobody who has seen the surprised, flattered, half-wary, all-shy look on Thomas' face when someone does the smallest nice thing for him would say that there's any such thing as _too _invested, at this point. It seems to be the smallest things that mean the most to him, sometimes - the big, grand gestures are ones they've both seen and heard and had before, from other men in other times, and they might look more but Richard has found that sometimes they're the most temporary ones, the most superficial. For Thomas, little things add up to mean big things - and for a good while the precise reason for that had escaped Richard's understanding, but now he knows. 

Focusing the little, mundane things is by far the best sign that somebody's been _paying attention_. (And that's all Thomas wants, isn't it? And still more than he dares, sometimes, to ask for - Richard's attention. To be seen.) He could turn up with an entire bloody rose garden and serenade his butler through the kitchen window, but he doesn't think it'd gain him the look Thomas had given him when he'd presented him with a bag of chocolate lime boiled sweets for the train home because he'd remembered that they were his favourites. (His own favourites are the rhubarb and custard ones, which Thomas is well aware of - Richard thinks he might keep a couple in his pocket at all times just in case he bumps into Richard in the middle of Thirsk or something, because any time they have to say a hurried goodbye (usually because one of them has lost track of the time and is late for the train - be that for one reason or another) he usually finds one in his pocket, right after Thomas has gone. He's snickered to himself on more than one occasion at the image of Thomas attempting to pat around and find Richard's dressing gown pocket to jam the sweet into while kissing him goodbye - mainly because his darling gets so very distracted during such displays of affection that he barely has the coordination to stop his knees from turning to jelly, let alone employ covert sweet-smuggling tactics.

Thomas doesn't just demonstrate this appreciation for detail when he's on its receiving end, either. Last year in January, when the floodwaters had overflown from the Cotswolds and the Thames had burst its banks, and a good bit of central London had been waterlogged, Thomas had phoned right as Richard got home for the day, worrying about whether or not he was alright. The instancy with which he rang meant he'd probably already phoned more than once, too - though he'd avoided saying so when Richard had asked. By all means, he should've known Richard was alright - the papers had listed the streets affected by the floods, of which Richard's hadn't been one, luckily, and seeing as he had to havean address to write to Thomas would've seen this. But he had still phoned, and it seems even now that it had been more so about making sure Richard knew he cared than actually checking in.

So, yes. If he _is _too invested - and is it possible to be, when the rewards of knowing Thomas Barrow are far more than the investment? - then it's not just him. He saves the crossword.

He spends a while looking out of the window, watching distant cotton wads of sheep blur past for another twenty minutes or so, until he finally gets too bored - at the next station, he's waiting in the gangway ready for when they stop, and hurries to the small kiosk opposite his compartment window, selling cheap paperbacks. He picks up a slim volume he's probably read before, but doesn't own now - _The Call of the Wild_, probably lost it, if he'd ever had it - and jumps back onto the train only half a minute before the doors shut and they're moving again. 

* * *

"So, why've the family invited you back again?" Daisy asks, ferrying dishes to and fro. She'd asked the same earlier, but he'd arrived at possibly the worst moment, (mostly because Thomas had met him at the station, and they'd dawdled terribly on the walk back, catching up and, at one point, catching kisses from each other's mouths behind a conveniently draped willow tree just off the deserted footpath) and his answer had been lost in the bustle as the kitchen became busy with the upstairs dinner things. There's nowhere he can sit or stand without being almost bowled over by a flustered Andy or swatted out of the way by Mrs Patmore, who doesn't care if it's the Prince of bloody Wales sat there if they're getting in the way while she's cooking, so he's taken to ferrying the dishes to the bottom of the stairs ready for when Andy comes back down to fetch them. He's just sent the last dinner dishes up, and they won't be needing to take the pudding for a little while, so he finally stops and leans against the doorway. 

"To cut a long story short," he says, "I sold a painting a few months ago without knowing exactly where it was going or who it was going to, and it's ended up on the wall in some big house. Her Ladyship must've visited it for tea or something, and liked it, and found out from the signature that it was by the same Ellis who came here for the Royal visit. That, or she requested I come without realising the connection until she'd seen my face. But - yes, the family asked me to come because they want to commission some portraits. His Lordship wanted to bring back the tradition, I think - or maybe it was the Dowager."

He almost misses Daisy's next question, because that's when Thomas comes back in, through the same doorway Richard is leaning in the way of. It's funny - he's seen Thomas squeeze through the slightest gaps in doorways and rooms when he needs to get past people, albeit sometimes with a bit of scrambling, and so he knows full well that the butler is capable of edging past anyone and still keeping space between their bodies. (He suspects the practice at avoiding contact, sudden or passing, is more than just some kind of distance or prickliness, but he doesn't ask about these things, because if he doesn't already know it then it usually means Thomas isn't ready to tell it.) But despite the several feet of space in the doorway, Thomas still brushes against Richard, their hands nudging for a moment before he's away again. It's brief, but warming. He doesn't fully realise they've touched until afterwards, like when a cat has strolled past you and its tail curls around you as it leaves. It means-

Well, it means a _lot _of things, all of which he'll attempt to contemplate over dinner later, in between conversations. 

"How much are they going to pay you, d'you think, for all your trouble?" Daisy sounds doubtful, and from what he's seen and heard of her Richard doesn't have a terrible amount of trouble doubting that if the price he names isn't good enough in her eyes, she'll march on up there and attempt to argue until his cheque's been substantially increased.

"Daisy!" Mrs Patmore scolds. "It's not up to you to ask him that, and it's not up to poor Mr Ellis to tell you."

"But-"

"Meringues. _Now_." From where he's waiting to retrieve the puddings, Thomas exchanges a Look with him. He grins back.

He's not one for dispute, however, and he isn't sure how much Daisy thinks work like that is worth, anyhow, so he settles for an answer that will hopefully satisfy both the person he's focused on and the people he isn't. "Enough to make it well worth my while." Daisy huffs, before shooting the cook a triumphant look. 

"_Well_. I suppose that's alright then." 

"And I'm sure he's _so _relieved to have your approval, thank God you're here to vet our wages for us. _Meringue_, Daisy!" 

He turns his head a little to the right as Thomas passes him, not willing to encroach more than that - Thomas had chosen to let them brush past each other the first time, and Richard will not go to fast or too far come the second. "It's far more than the money that makes it so worthwhile," he murmurs in his ear. Rather than say anything, Thomas turns just so as he gets to the stairs with the meringue, gives Richard a look that leaves him more than a little bit weak at the knees. There's a lively gleam in his eyes, and in the darkened hallway Richard knows it's not just from lamplight this time. He doesn't look away even as he ascends the stairs, and Richard meets his gaze as he goes.

"If you don't keep your face lined up with your feet, that meringue's going to be a melting snowball on a carpet," Mrs Patmore calls, last shreds of impatience clinging on in the aftermath of the dinner rush, which has almost the opposite intended affect - although Thomas does as he's told, he does a little jump at the unexpected remark that, thankfully, doesn't dislodge the dessert. Richard snaps his gaze away at the same time, for Thomas' sake more than his own, and though it stings, he's almost glad he'd looked elsewhere, because that's how he sees that Mrs Patmore almost looks regretful. Daisy walks over to her under the pretence of mopping up a stain on the tabletop, but doesn't make much more of an effort than that to show her real intention.

"What'd you have to go and do _that _for?" She near-hisses, and he's not sure if it's a hiss because of the volume or the ire in her voice. "Leave them be, for God's sake!" Mrs Patmore turns to start on some of the dirty dishes from the starter, amd Daisy takes the opportunity to come over and stand in the doorway with him.

"I am sorry, about that," she says in a low tone. "And she is too, now that she's bloody _thought _about it for more than half a second. She doesn't mean any harm, though - he's probably told you how she is when we're doing the dinner. Focuses on fondant more than feelings." She rolls her eyes, but it's good-natured. Put a bit more at ease, Richard lets his shoulders relax a fraction, smiles subtly, half-turned to her and half angled towards the staircase still, a part of him stubbornly hoping Thomas'll be back down soon. 

"Never mind," he says, "No harm done, after all, is there." It sounds more like a question than he'd like it to - Thomas hates the smell of burnt toast and inside-out umbrellas and train tunnels that are too long and getting caught in the rain and the whole long month of November and a cluster of other things, but most of all, he hates being _seen _when he doesn't wish to be. Daisy's been here the longest, perhaps, along with Thomas - so she knows it as well as Richard does. (Well, he's not sure if she knows about the tunnels or the umbrellas, but the final part he's sure she does.) She shakes her head, however, and Richard's breath leaks out in relief.

"Nothing permanent. You know he's skittish as well as I do, but I think he knows she didn't mean it like _that_. By now he will, at least." He wants to ask what _now _is as compared to _then_, but from what he knows about how things have been for Thomas here, he thinks he can guess. He hopes that she isn't implying it'd be foolish of Thomas not to know, though, and he finds he can't entirely keep his mouth shut.

"Couldn't entirely blame him if he didn't, though," he says, even though the part of his brain dedicated to keeping him looking like That Nice Mr Ellis With His Ready Smile And Easygoing Nature is screaming _what are you doing, who are you and what are you doing, you're just a guest, don't do this_. Whatever he was expecting to see on Daisy's face (indignation was his best guess) he wasn't expecting this look of almost-sadness, of regretful resignation.

"No," she says, quietly. "I don't think I could." Then her smile becomes a little less sad again. "That's why I want to give him a _reason _not to assume the worst about us. We got on at him so many times about not asking for help, for assuming we wouldn't give it if he did, but we'd never proven to him that we would." Something in his stance must soften, at that, because she relaxes properly too. He quirks an eyebrow.

"I'm relieved to hear it - you can't know how much. It's good to know someone's fighting Mr Barrow's corner for him, while I'm up in London." Then, "I have to ask - nobody seem surprised that we're - close. Did he give them all some kind of talk about me before I got here?" Though it's said in jest, he has been wondering - Thomas likes his privacy, likes _their _privacy, cautious as he is, and given that it means Richard can't imagine him telling every Lord and his dog here about them, he wants to know why everyone seems so careful and yet so relaxed around him. Daisy shakes her head, looking sheepish.

"I think you know he wouldn't have, don't you. No, it - it was me, actually. I didn't tell them _everything, _mind," she rushes to reassure him, "seeing as it's not my business, and not my story to tell, anyway. I just said - I just said that seeing as you were a guest, and the family had asked you back, and you were such help during the visit, not like all the rest of the royal lot, we should all make you feel welcome and not crowd you with silly questions. That's all." She pauses, nervous - "that _was _alright, wasn't it?" He nods. 

"Course it was. Thanks - it's made it easier, anyhow." He's angled more towards her than before, only half-consciously. Miss Mason isn't half good at getting someone's guard down. "Do - do any of them know anyway? I know you've not told them, but - have they figured it out?" His voice is hushed, and on fear of Daisy's rebuke Mrs Patmore seems to be very carefully Not Listening, clanging pots and pans around in the kitchen. Daisy tilts her head.

"I don't know, really. I think they've all figured out you're friends, obviously - Mr Barrow doesn't talk to any of us _half _so much as you when you're here. And there's something about how he looks at you - but, never mind. It won't do you any good to overanalyse it, I'll bet, because then you'll be all funny with him without meaning to, and it'll bother him. He must feel at least settled to let us notice as much as he has, let's not ruin it." He's surprised - he'd known she was clever from the get-go, although not very careful about who she voiced her opinions on monarchism to, but not quite this perceptive. 

"You seem to know how to go about these things very well."

She shrugs. "I think it's just because of me an' Andy, really. I did the same - I was all careful about how I spoke to him, what I said, how I acted, because I didn't want anyone to know I liked him and tease me about it, but I did it all wrong, and in the end the only one I convinced that I wasn't bothered about him _was _him." He's trying not to huff out a laugh, and she must know, because she raises her eyebrows at him pointedly, although still smirking. "So, yeah. It's not the best way to go about it - specially when you already worry about spooking him. Nobody down here'd mind if they did find out, and if they did they'd keep it to themselves - after the earfuls Mrs Hughes has given Mr Carson about it, I don't think they'd say a word about it, let alone against it - but you still don't want them knowing all your business when it's not on your own terms, course, so yeah - I think they know you're at least friends, probably close friends, _possibly _more depending on how bright they are." He tilts his head a little.

"And, on that basis, which ones do you think would figure it out, and which ones wouldn't?" She smiles again, teasing. 

"Mind yourself, Mr Ellis - you've not been here long, I'll not go naming names yet. Suppose you tell on me, I'll never hear the end of it." She turns to head back into the kitchen, somehow giving the impression, without speaking, that she expects him to follow. 

"Fair enough," he acquiesces, in good humour. She pulls out a chair for him, next to the one at the head of the table - he knows who's supposed to be sitting at the head, in the chair closest to the one she pulls out, and it makes his heart feel like it's doing funny butterfly loops in his chest, sends his legs giddy. She pats it invitingly as Mrs Patmore gets ready to start sorting out the servants' dinner, until he sits. 

"Just between you and me," she murmurs next to his ear, "If you want names, I don't think Mr Molesley's even realised you know each other, yet." 

* * *

It makes him glad, to realise that the house isn't only filled with people who tolerate Thomas, but like him - want him here, and regret how he's been treated. He knows, after all, that a lack of opposition doesn't mean support. A lack of hatred doesn't mean friendliness. And, yes, Thomas _says _that they're good to him, now - but considering, again, the look on his face when Richard does the slightest nice thing for him, Richard has long wondered exactly what _good _means in this context. Now he knows, and the knowledge that his lover has Daisy Mason fighting his corner puts him at ease some more. He wonders, as well, however, how many times, even _after _the new understanding the staff have of Thomas, they've hurt him and never known. He hopes it isn't too many, but after what Mrs Patmore has unknowingly said he isn't sure. He wishes he knew what exactly to say, to make them aware of it - of the fact that Thomas doesn't always _say, _when he's been hurt. He's either prickly or quiet when that happens - but if he knows these people by now, which he thinks he does somewhat, then he knows that, in their eyes, Thomas is 'just like that'. He _is _prickly. He _is _quiet. He's not always easy to talk to. 

But they're terribly, terribly wrong. It's not Thomas' fault they're wrong about him, either. He just acts like himself - it's their fault if they've chosen to look but decided that seeing is too much effort. Thomas is someone who smiles - a lot, in fact. He has the kind of face that seems to be made for it - he smiles when he's happy, smiles when he's surprised with a kiss on the cheek or a hand on his shoulder or a chin on the top of his head while he's working on something at the table. When he's freed from the necessary statuesque stillness of service, he paces up and down, raises his eyebrows comically when surprised or sarcastic, waves his arms around when talking, especially when excited. If Richard were to ask him to give him a four hour talk about clocks, he most definitely could - whether he _would _is, of course, a different question, because it'd take quite some convincing until he believed Richard actually _wanted _him to, wouldn't get ridiculously bored with him. (As if he ever has, ever could, at the sound of Thomas' voice.) In conclusion - although he could easily think on Thomas' attributes for much, much longer - Thomas is not what so many of them seem to think he is. In some ways, they don't know what he's like because he hasn't always shown them - but it's not his fault he's been given reasons to put his walls up high, either. Perhaps he's judging them too harshly, but he doesn't get as much of a say in things when that burning, protective thing rises from its dormancy in his chest. 

* * *

Richard wakes up from the dream not quite realising he's had one, at first. There's only the ceiling of the room he's staying in, dull curtain-muffled moonlight painting the ceiling like the reflection of the water on the underside of a bridge, and a lingering sense of unease. Then it comes back to him, slowly, and he has to curl on his side and bite his lip to contain the welling-up of grief, gone out like the swash of the tide upon waking and now flooding back in like the backwash that comes a little further up the shore than expected to soak your toes and leave you cold. It's only a dream, of course, he tells himself. It's only a dream. You didn't lose him, haven't lost him, he's alright, he's fine, he's happy. He hasn't got to worry about where he'll go. He's the butler, and he's here to stay. And if it all went wrong again, he could come to Richard. Thomas knows that. He _knows_.

_We got on at him so many times about not asking for help, for assuming we wouldn't give it if he did, but we'd never proven to him that we would._

_Does _he know?

Richard is flooded with the overwhelming urge to check - to see Thomas is here, just to make sure. He hasn't been into Thomas' room yet - though well-meaning, Andy's insistence on showing Richard to his room so he could 'get an early night, after all that travel, eh?' had meant that he'd been up here long before most of the others, and the sound of an awake house hadn't ceased for a good hour or two, after that. He'd lain down, waiting for everything to go quiet, but even then Thomas had still been up - one of his busier evenings, then. He'd listened for the telltale footsteps, the ones Thomas makes when trying to be quiet but becoming clumsy in it, but it seems Andy had a point - the travel has knackered him more than it once would have, the warmth of the train injecting him with a drowsiness that hadn't quite leeched from his system afterwards, and he'd fallen asleep. (_All was not lost, however - before going up he'd asked if Andy could wait a moment, begged off under the pretence of having left something in the hall near the back door, and knocked on the door to Thomas' pantry. 'A lot of fuss to give me a goodnight kiss,' Thomas had said, and it hadn't been, not at all, but Richard hadn't said so because he hadn't actually kissed Thomas yet, and it was Thomas asking for something in that meandering, roundabout way of those who don't feel they've earned the privilege to ask for things, so rather than speak he'd set about fulfilling the not-request rather thoroughly, until Thomas was half-leaning against his chest as their lips parted and looking up at him in a daze. 'Goodnight,' Richard had said, pressing another kiss to the spot on Thomas' forehead where a single dark strand of hair had come down from the rest, as Thomas blinked rapidly and attempted to regain balance. It had been quite a good goodnight, as they went, and he's resolved to give Thomas one always, now. If he can't telephone, he'll start sending telegrams with that single word on them, with instructions to only open them at bedtime. He'll write to Downton's milkman, and enclose the words on a label tied to a bit of string to wrap around the neck of the bottle - with Thomas being kept up so late and the milkman coming so early, they've probably crossed paths.) _

It's already been too long since he'd last seen him, and his resolve breaks. He doesn't take a lamp just to go across the men's corridor, of course, so it's lucky he knows the door already - he'd never be able to make out the names written on each one in this light. He eases the door open, just slightly, enough to crane his wrist around it and knock, softly, but on the inside of the door so as to lessen the sound for anyone in a neighbouring room, although it's only Andy and Albert, now. He receives no answer telling him to sod off, so he opens it a bit more and eases himself in through the space as quietly as possible - the old doors don't half creak. He eases the door to again, and stands there for a minute, the darkness growing and receding at the corners of his eyes like dark curtains billowing as his eyes adjust to the low light. Everything is grey and grainy in the night, but in the bed he can see a shape, sure enough, and the soft whistle of sleepy breaths. He's here, and he's alright, and he's also been up until about half two in the morning, so as far as reassurance goes, this'll have to do. He turns and makes to leave, but freezes when he hears the sound of a body turning over in the bed, springs twanging lightly.

"s'that you, Rich?" comes the soft murmur. He turns around, embarrassed at being caught and hoping that it hasn't come off seeming as strange as it probably must. 

"Yeah, just me," he answers, equally soft, if not softer. "Sorry, didn't want to wake you up - you can go back to sleep." 

"No, s'fine, wasn't properly asleep anyhow," he hears, and Thomas drags himself into a sitting position in the bed, scrubbing at his sleepy eyes stubbornly. "C'mere - what's up?" 

"Nothing," he tries to lie even as he's padding over to the bed and perching on the edge, before Thomas pulls him to lie opposite him. 

"Load of horseshit. If you didn't want to wake me up but you still came, means either you were hoping I was already up or you needed me but didn't want to bother me. Or both." Thomas cranes around and the lamp on his nightstand fills the space around the bed with a pale amber glow. Thomas' brows are slightly furrowed in concern, and Richard sighs, unwilling to admit defeat but equally reluctant to keep Thomas up longer than he has to, so he might as well get on with it - it's not as though Thomas will stop asking until he's found out what's wrong. "Come on, out with it - why were you lurking in the doorway like I'd kick you out as soon as look at you?"

Something breaks, then, and he curls into Thomas, around him, head resting above and over Thomas' on the pillow, holding on to him as much as he can, but taking care not to hold on too tightly. "Because I had a dream about losing you, and it scared me half to bloody death. Because having you has come to mean so much to me that I don't think I can go back to not having you ever again." Thomas cranes his head to look up at him, expression inscrutable, his brow ever so slightly furrowed in a way that usually makes Richard want to kiss him senseless, but now just makes him want to hold him even more. It's all he seems to be capable of, at the moment. Thomas huffs out a little sigh, soft and whispy and whistling. It isn't exasperated, but it's not entirely sad either - it's something in between. 

"D'you want a biscuit?" He asks, and where Richard had been choked up and aching, he finds that he's so bewildered that he half-_laughs _as he responds. 

_"What?" _

He almost regrets it then, because Thomas winces like Richard had called him stupid, and backtracks slightly, hand loosening where it'd been gripping his shirt. "You're right, that was - stupid, that was insensitive, wasn't it, shit, sorry, I, uh-" he gives a nervous-sounding laugh that tapers off at the end. Richard draws back just enough to crane his neck down and look Thomas in the face.

"Hey, hey, that's not what I said - suppose you were only asking, weren't you. Wasn't stupid - just a bit random, that's all. What from all of that reminded you of biscuits?" He can feel a smile twitching at the corner of his mouth, and tries his best not to make it too obvious - it takes Thomas a good while to creep out of his shell, and if he thinks Richard's making sport of him he'll slink right back into it again. Thomas shrugs so Richard can feel it against his side, sharp shoulders just barely cushioned by Thomas' pyjama shirt. (He'd brought along the pair that Thomas had stolen last time, and left them on his bed. Neither of them has mentioned it, and they're not going to.) 

"Dunno, really, just - Mrs P always plies me with something sweet when I'm upset about something. Practically had a bouquet of brandy snaps marching around my teacup everyday, back when everything happened to me that summer." He looks uncertain again, then, perhaps wondering if he shouldn't have mentioned it, given that it's the root of Richard's distress, but Richard smiles, softly rather than amused, and rubs Thomas shoulder slowly. In the glide back up his hand brushes Thomas' collarbone, exposed by the slight gaping of the shirt, and realises how cool his skin feels. He feels for a corner of the duvet and pulls it up more, until their necks are covered too and the only thing exposed is their heads, from the jawbone upwards. 

"That makes sense, then. Thank you for the kind offer, but - I'm quite alright. You're my something sweet." It's too dim to tell in much detail, but Thomas is definitely blushing - his face has just gotten hotter against the side of Richard's neck.

"M'not sweet." He keeps smiling, almost painful in its intensity, as he rubs his chin over the top of Thomas' head. 

"I think you are. You're sweet for me, and you're sweet to the others. When they've not woken you up too early, that is." Thomas huffs.

"Sweet _on _you, as well," he mutters.

"Now, how on _earth _could I have already gotten _that _idea?" Thomas swats at him, not even pretending to be irritable. 

"Sod _off_, you." Then he stops, thoughtful, movements slowing again. He puts an arm around Richard's torso, worming relentlessly under his left arm to go around his back as well. He takes a breath, poised, then lets it out. "Someday," he says, carefully calm, voice not trembling because he won't let it, "the days we've been together will add up to more than the lifetimes we've spent apart." He says it so quietly, as if he daren't say it too loudly for fear of it seeming like more than he sees it as - a silly dream. "And while they do, I'm still here, counting them with you. I'm alright. And I'll do my damn best not to leave partway through the count."

Richard swallows with a click, his throat heavy again. "I hope so, Thomas, darling," he murmurs. "I really hope so, more than even you know." Thomas seems consoled by the affirmation and hums, sliding his head up Richard's chest, past his collarbone, to hook over the junction between neck and shoulder on Richard's left side. This way, his left cheek is squashed firmly into Richard's neck, their skin sandwiched together, his cooling Richard's and Richard's warming his. He tucks his knees up, presses them closer. Then, Richard's stomach makes a soft grumbling sound, just loud enough that they both hear it.

"Do you know, Thomas," Richard says, because he knows how he shivers when his first name is used more than necessary, and Richard wants to speak it at least once in every breath until he knows the name's feeling on his tongue more intimately than breathing, "I could actually quite do with that biscuit, if you're still offering." He says it partially genuinely, and partially because of the secret smirk Thomas will tuck against his skin, but unexpectedly Thomas bursts out laughing, chin tilting up as the sound escapes him, and _oh_. Richard's not sure he's ever heard that before. He's gotten chuckles, soft, shy things, he's gotten wry, dry barks of amusement - he hasn't heard _this_, and it might genuinely be the most wonderful noise he's ever heard. Unfortunately, it's almost three in the morning, so Thomas stuffs his face back into Richard's neck to muffle it, the sound coming out in wheezes and hot breaths against that patch of skin - Thomas jerks with it, shoulders shaking, and Richard feels his own eyes scrunch at the corners, has to hide a full grin in Thomas' hairline. 

_"You asked"_ Thomas wheezes from somewhere below his chin, _"all that, _and me worried I'd been ruinin' the moment, and then you're the one who went and_ asked _for the _bloody biscuit." _Richard snorts. 

"Sorry. Wouldn't want to take the b-" Thomas' head shoots up, his gaze fierce, and suddenly his finger is on Richard's lips, just the opposite to how it had been, what - _God_, nearly _two years ago _this summer, how does that _work. _

"Don't you _dare," _he mutters fervently. "Don't you even _think _about finishin' that sentence, Richard Graham Ellis." Richard snorts, underneath the finger.

"Sorry," he squeezes out. "I did mean it, though-" Thomas just shakes his head, mock-exasperated this time. 

"You know what, just- take it, just take one-" he says, turning to his right to scrabble in the drawer of the nightstand before thrusting a tin at Richard, lid carefully popped open so that the twang of metal is quiet. Richard raises his eyebrows. 

"How did you-why do you-" Thomas rolls his eyes.

"Like I said. Brandy snaps. Marchin' around my plate. She still does it, half the time, think the woman's just gone a bit mad. But it helps, a bit, if I wake up and I'm upset. Or can't sleep, for the same reason. Hence the stash." Richard grins, and takes what feels vaguely like a custard cream. It turns out to be a bourbon - even better. For him, anyway - Thomas jealously guards his chocolatey goods, and once he realises he leans up and bites a bit off the end, making Richard nearly choke in surprise. 

"You-" 

"You can have the rest of that one," Thomas says, oh-so-generously, through a mouthful. "Since you were upset an' all. Just don't get crumbs in here - if they know I've got a little collection-"

Richard swallows a mouthful. "Sorry, but too late. Think you got some on your pillow, when you did your little trick." Thomas looks down and pats the pillow. 

"Shite, you're right. Oh, for God's-" He swipes at the case, attempting to remove the evidence. The crumbs just fall onto the mattress instead, and he growls. "You're lucky I love you, you know." And then he falters. 

Richard is taking a moment to process what he's just heard - he could've happily lived an entire life without Thomas saying it and it wouldn't matter, because he'd _know_ \- of course he would. But Thomas has said it, and he finds that it _does _matter, that for a moment in time Thomas felt safe enough here to let the words out. But then he realises that Thomas has gone rigid, spine ramrod-straight, no longer nestled into Richard. Oh, dear, he thinks, and sets about patching things up. He shifts down the bed until their faces are level. "Thomas," he says, just once, just softly. 

Thomas swallows audibly, the dry click of it too loud between them. Richard reaches up to put a hand on his cheek, hovering there for a moment first - when Thomas does nothing, he rests his palm on his cheek, thumb grazing Thomas' cheekbone more carefully than ever before. "_Thomas_." Thomas' face is carefully blank, or it tries to be, at least - the wavering look is in his eyes again, like a deer staring down the barrel of a shotgun on one of the hunts. 

"Don't," he whispers, though it sounds a little more like a squeak, "just - just don't." Richard's brow furrows, and he can't stop himself from looking sad - he hopes his expression doesn't appear pitying, because then Thomas will go. He seems to fear mockery and condescension as much as abandonment, probably because in his unfortunate experience the former is usually a build up to the latter. And he doesn't want to pity Thomas now. He means what he has said - his terror betrays that easily. It makes it all the worse, that he feels he still ought not to say it when it means so much to him, and as much as Richard wants to talk about it, wants to show that it means enough to him as well that he doesn't want to sweep Thomas' slip of the tongue neatly under the rug, if he keeps pressing - well, Thomas will run, he thinks. And he couldn't take it. Especially not tonight. 

So Richard is a little bit selfish. "Alright," he says, lowering the hand from Thomas' cheek, although he takes his hand instead and smooths a soothing circle over the back of it. "It's alright, Thomas. You're alright." The rising tide is quelled, for now, and Thomas' panic simmers where it was ready to bubble over. He blinks a bit too quickly, as if trying to beat back everything Richard could see so clearly in his gaze a moment before, and although his face still betrays little, there's a slackening of the jaw that speaks of tentative relief. Even when Thomas is not talking to him, he also still sort of is - he tells Richard everything, whether he means to or not, and it's almost never with words. If it's something he's not ready to share, Richard will file away the betraying factor - a flicker of his gaze, the twitch of a hand, a quirk of the mouth - as if he had never seen it, so that when Thomas is ready to share something Richard can learn it all over again. He's told Richard everything now, too, except he's done it aloud - when he never lets himself, normally. This is unsteady ground to tread, because it's _harder _than when Thomas is closed-off - somehow, he's just even more vulnerable. He feels vulnerable and stupid and sensitive and Richard's not sure if he could ever sleep at night again if he makes the wrong move now.

So when Thomas gulps in air, nods shakily, turns over and curls into a ball on his right side to go to sleep, he just stays where he is on his own side - not too close, not crowding - and reaches an arm over, drapes it over Thomas' side, wrist connecting with the jut of the edge of his ribcage, just so that the closeness is there. He doesn't know if Thomas is asleep - if he'll even manage to, after this - but he assumes he is, not hearing the telltale nervous rattle of breath or pounding heart he'd expect if he were awake. He waits a while, nonetheless, and when enough time has passed, he shifts, just slightly, to press his lips to the back of Thomas' head, the touch so fleeting it's barely even there.

"I love you too." 

He can't tell, in the dark, if the slight squeeze of his hand is real or a half-dream. 

* * *

He wakes after a fitful, not-quite sleep in the early hours of morning. The light is silvery and tiptoeing, and since it's only early april that puts the time at about a quarter to six - maybe a little earlier. He knows, logically, that he ought to be getting up and going back to his room soon - but it's at least half an hour, still, before Thomas has to get up, and he's loathe to wake him sooner than he needs to, especially after he'd kept him up another hour talking and then - well. He doubts Thomas fell into a deep sleep for a while, after what had been said. 

He's reluctant to do either - and so he doesn't. He really _should _get going, really, but either it will wake Thomas - which would be dreadful, so early, when he's got a full day of work ahead of him - or it won't. And he doesn't want to think about that, about leaving now without waking him, to wake up to an empty bed after he's accidentally told Richard the one thing he's been perhaps the most afraid to say. 

Instead, he stays awake, ready to slip away if things sound like they're getting busy in the corridors but allowing himself to fall back into the contented, drowsy haze that is an early morning with Thomas. Thomas who has, Richard realises as he's coming around, turned over in the night to face him again, curled up on his side but curled almost towards Richard, one leg stretched at angle to almost touch Richard's - all in all, Thomas in his current state is shaped like a very cuddly apostrophe. 

And Richard's arm is still draped over him. 

It remains so, still, for another half an hour, Richard resting his head on the pillow, eyes half-lidded, watching as the light brightens and paints over the side of Thomas' face. Thomas yawns, a soft, sweet thing, a puff of warm air with a noise that's half a squeak at the end, his hands clasped together as he stretches his arms languorously in front of him, eyes still scrunched shut, neck and spine and limbs all arching like a cat in a way that's ridiculously endearing. Then, his outstetching hands bump against Richard, and Thomas jumps, bless him, and tries to quickly blink the sleep from his eyes. Richard stays relaxed, cheek pressed into the pillow, though still looking at Thomas all the while until he seems to have woken up and acknowledged Richard's presence properly. 

And his expression, when he does, is breathtaking.

He looks almost reverent as he stares at Richard, something akin to wonder in his eyes, and Richard wonders if he's about to have his face given a sharp poke to prove he's really there. "You stayed," he breathes.

Richard nods. Tries to keep his expression kind, because that's what he wants to be to Thomas, in this moment. Everything else can differ, but the sole non-negotiable is that people should be kind to Thomas, and ought always to have been. "I did."

"You - _stayed_." He seems to emphasise it as if Richard is being silly, as if he doesn't- can't -understand what exactly makes that mean so much. 

_Because none of the others stayed, did they? _He thinks. _They just - left you, and they shouldn't have. They really, really shouldn't have. _

"Should I not have?" He asks, careful not to sound accusing.

"I don't - I don't know, I- maybe? Probably. Maybe? For - for your benefit, I mean." He's stammering, eyes darting every which way - scrambling for reasons he can't have this. Or, rather, reasons why Richard should know better than to give it to him. Like he's asking for something he doesn't deserve, and it's up to the person he's asking to remind him of his place in the order of things. He shrugs loosely.

"I don't know. Spending those extra few hours with you felt pretty beneficial, to me." 

"I - it did?"

With anybody else, Richard might have reminded them that if they wanted him to stay they could've just asked, and he'd stay. But Thomas never asks for a single damn thing, doesn't expect it either, and that makes him want to give him everything even more. He takes a leap, then.

"I told you, didn't I - I love you too." Thomas stares at him, stares and stares, as if he's just spotted the milky way in Richard's gaze. Then: 

"You stayed," he whispers in a trance, craning up and pressing their foreheads together. "You _stayed._"

"Darling," Richard murmurs, pressing a soft kiss to that spot at the top of the bridge of Thomas' nose, that little stretch of skin that crinkles_ just so_ when Thomas wrinkles his nose. (The first time he'd observed it was _there's not much fun to be had in York._ It had smoothed out with the help of _You'd be surprised - I grew up there._The crinkle came back, at the corners of Thomas' eyes, for the _So surprise me then, Mr Ellis. I'm not used to being surprised, so the novelty hasn't had the chance to wear off._ It had been running through Thomas' entire frame for _Was it you who got me out? How did you know where I'd gone? _As if he'd been trying to crumple himself into a ball like a discarded receipt, and that was the only one of the crinkles that Richard had yearned to smooth out.)

"Darling Thomas," he continues, feeling especially bold at this unexpected show of affection, for once not initiated by him, and raw in its intensity, "of course I did." Thomas wriggles closer still, and the sudden lack of hesitance takes Richard's breath away. 

"Wasn't sure," he mumbles, "after-" and stops. 

"Silly," Richard breathes, not leaning away from the press of foreheads, reaching up to cradle the back of Thomas' head, "my silly boy." Thomas huffs something half a sigh and half a sob.

"For God's sake," he mutters, half-heartedly. And then, sounding more tired than he had the first time he'd woken up, "Listen - I don't know about - saying it, that is, it's not that I don't- I need you to know it's not because of that. Because of you."

Richard smiles, a softer, more secret thing than the smiles he gives everyone else. "Thomas, love. I know."

"You do?" His expression is a bit deer-in-the-headlights, two parts wary and three parts disbelief.

"I do. Come here."

Thomas flops into his chest again like he's been dropped from a great height, like a puppet with its strings cut. They stay curled together for as long as possible, until they have to face the day, and even then he halts Thomas' rushing with an "I am a valet, Mr Barrow," spoken teasingly, and helps him with his livery. His knuckle brushes Thomas' neck as he ties his tie, feels his Adam's apple bob as he gulps the way he does when he gets a bit nervous. Richard soothes and shushes him, meeting his gaze steadily in a way that seems to ground him like little else, lets his thumb move up to smooth over the side of Thomas' neck. Together, it all has the same effect as jesses stopping a falcon from spiralling away into the other when spooked. Richard inclines his head, lifts his brows, and Thomas nods, a bit more certainty to him. Richard wonders, privately, if the nerves are from his being here - from the words exchanged, from the intimacy of this - or if this is every morning, Thomas preparing himself to go down there and be the butler when he's not sure he can, when he knows at least one of them upstairs will never be entirely satisfied because he's not bloody Mr Carson. (The concept of wanting him to be anything other than what he is is still so _strange _to Richard- it's like being disappointed with a beautiful ppaintingfor not being a black and white newspaper clipping.) 

Either way, Thomas is ready, and settled, and after nipping back to his room and getting ready (the corridor is thankfully empty - they're a few minutes later than the rest) he meets Thomas at the top of the stairs so they can go down together. He has half a mind to brush his hand with Thomas' as they descend, but he doesn't want the house's shiny new butler to end up having an accident because Richard held his hand, and so he refrains for the good of the house and the country, which is vastly improved by Thomas' continued existence. When they reach the bottom he's the one who stops, with a gesture, and after a few beats follows Thomas in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, and thank you for reading, just one more quick message!
> 
> You may recall that at the beginning of chapter 4 I posted the link to a wonderful illustration done for this fic by @niryda on tumblr (if you don't, please please go and look at it, it's GORGEOUS) and I'm now here to tell you that the same illustration is available for purchase as a postcard or mug or a whole host of other lovely items in her redbubble shop! (My postcard of it is already safely on my noticeboard.) Here's the link to the piece in her store:  
https://www.redbubble.com/i/postcard/A-sketch-page-by-niryda/46428309.V7PMD
> 
> If you liked, or hopefully, loved, her artwork for this fic or otherwise, and want to show your support to my lovely talented artist friend, feel free to visit the link and purchase! (Psst...it's not the only piece of Thomas/Richard art available on her redbubble, either.)


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